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GOP Planning to Use Disaster Aid as a Bargaining Chip

Thu, 08/25/2011 - 12:51pm — Miranda

Steve Benen points out that in the wake of Tuesday’s East Coast earthquake and in anticipation of the hurricane expected to hit the eastern states this weekend, House Republicans are getting ready to use disaster aid as a political bargaining chip.

Specifically, House Majority Leader Eric Cantor is making it clear that the House won’t dole out disaster aid unless it is met by equal budget cuts to a clean-energy program – a kind of political bargain that’s usually off the table for urgent relief funds. Benen writes:

For all of our differences over party, ideology, and creed, we know that when disaster strikes and our neighbors face a genuine emergency, America responds. We don’t ask what’s in it for us; we don’t weigh the political considerations; we don’t pause to ponder the larger ideological implications. That’s just not how the United States is supposed to operate.

Until now.

I can’t help but wonder why Republicans don’t hesitate to finance wars without paying for them, bailout Wall Street without paying it, and offer subsidies to oil companies without paying for them, but when an American community is struck by a natural disaster, all of a sudden, the GOP is inclined to hold the funds until the party gets offsetting cuts.